From Localised Social Structures to Localities as Agents

Abstract

The paper is an attempt to clarify the concept of locality for further research by investigating two common meanings of locality: locality as localised social structure and locality as agent. The first is developed through linking local dependence to territorial forms of the division of labour; to enable this a new concept, ‘the scale division of labour’, is introduced. This concept describes what roles in the social division of labour exist at different scales, and hence of what social relations the localised social structure consists. The locality as agent concept is developed from the idea of locally dependent actors with interests in the same locality forming an alliance, acting together to develop and implement strategies to further their interests. This avoids spatial fetishism because locality was first defined not in physical terms, but as localised social structure.